European MPs vote in favor of the Goldstone report on the Gaza war

The European Parliament has voted in favor of the Goldstone report on Israel’s war in Gaza. Earlier, the European Jewish Congress warned that the report’s implementation could hurt relations between the EU and Israel.

The report, prepared by South African Judge Richard Goldstone, accuses Israel of perpetrating war crimes during last year’s conflict in Gaza and proposes prosecuting Israeli officials in the International Criminal Court. The report had originally stirred much debate, with Israeli officials claiming it lacked “credibility and reliability.”

“The resolution that we adopted only a half an hour ago urges the High Representative of the EU and the Council of Ministers to implement the recommendations of the Goldstone report. We don’t adopt the report as such,” said European Parliament member Annemie Neyts-Uyttebroeck. “The most important of the [recommendations] is that both Israel and the Palestinian authorities, Fatah and Hamas, set up an independent investigation to come up with their findings and conclusions on what has really happened before, during and after the Isareali actions against Gaza at the end of 2008 until early January 2009."

Although the report was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in November, the UN did not call for its immediate implementation, instead urging both sides to conduct their own investigations into the war.